Records

August 24, 2011

Reaching the top of K2 on her fourth attempt, Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner, a 40-year-old Austrian alpinist who resides in Germany, has become the first woman to summit all 14 of the world’s 8,000-meter peaks without using supplementary oxygen. Kaltenbrunner reached the top of K2, Earth’s second-tallest mountain, at 6:18 p.m. (local time) Tuesday, August 23.

Kaltenbrunner, supported by grants from the National Geographic Society, was one of four climbers to reach the summit of K2. Other team members to summit were Maxut Zhumayev and Vassiliy Pivtsov of Kazakhstan and Darius Zaluski of Poland. Kaltenbrunner’s husband, Ralf Dujmovits of Germany, and photographer Tomas Heinrich of Argentina had turned back to base camp August 19, judging the threat of an avalanche too great. Heinrich is documenting the expedition for an upcoming article for National Geographic magazine.

The K2 achievement also was a milestone for Zhumayev and Pivtsov; the ascent of K2 fulfilled their dream of climbing all 14 of the 8,000-meter peaks without using extra oxygen.

“I can't believe how lucky we were to reach the summit together in this fantastic weather, despite the difficult conditions during the ascent,” Kaltenbrunner said. “I would like to thank everyone for their ‘mental support,’ which I could clearly feel and which literally carried me to the summit.”

In the days approaching the summit, the team waded through waist-deep snow and battled high winds, with avalanche conditions that for several days made the attempt at the summit look implausible.

According to alpine record-keeper Eberhard Jurgalski, before the achievement of Kaltenbrunner, Zhumayev and Pivtsov, only 24 people in the world had made it to the top of all 14 tallest mountains. This includes Dujmovits, who ascended K2 in 1994 and completed scaling the entire set of peaks two years ago. Only 10 of the 24 made the ascents without supplementary oxygen.

Kaltenbrunner and her team began the march to the K2 northern base camp from Xinjiang, China, on June 17. A group of camels ferried the team, their equipment and supplies to the Chinese base camp, about 3,900 meters high, crossing the wild Shaksgam Valley in the process. The team then ascended the peak via the North Pillar, a direct line to the summit, first climbed in 1982 by a Japanese team.

K2, located on the Pakistan-China border, is 8,611 meters (28,251 feet) high and part of the Karakoram Range. It has a reputation of being the hardest of the 8,000-meter-high mountains to climb, due chiefly to its steepness and the resulting technical-climbing challenges as well as unpredictable weather conditions. Since K2 was first summited by an Italian team in 1954, about 300 climbers have stood on top of the mountain, but many have perished trying. Kaltenbrunner’s attempt to summit K2 last year ended with the death of team member Fredrick Ericsson.

November 11, 2010

The Scandinavians have long been known for their polar exploration so it came as a surprise to us when a Swedish woman named Annelie Pompe snatched the new free diving world record in the Variable Weight Apnea class in October. The smiley 29-year-old rode a weighted sled 126 meters down into the Red Sea, then ascended back to the surface along a line. That’s 413 feet, underwater, with nothing but a mask and some flippers.

And it doesn’t stop there. An accomplished mountaineer, Pompe is planning to take on Mount Everest in May. Assuming all goes well, she’ll then set her lungs to the task of breaking Nat Geo Adventure favorite, Tanya Streeter’s No Limit class free-dive world record. (For an explanation of the different competitive classes, check out the free diving wikipedia page.)

Clearly, we had to talk to this lady and figure out what she loves so much about oxygen deprivation. We tracked her down to her home in Sweden this week for a few questions. English may not be her first language but she had a lot of interesting things to say.

When people think of free diving, Sweden isn’t the first country that springs to mind. How did you get into the sport?

There's actually quite a lot of divers in Sweden. I grew up close by the sea and I've always felt at home in the ocean. I don't think that feeling has any continental boundaries.

Since I loved being in the sea I got a scuba certification as soon as I was allowed to—and I really enjoyed it. Though I realized after a few years that the best feeling was diving in the water without any clumsy equipment. So I took up free diving and found a free-diving course. I was immediately captured by the challenge of diving as deep as possible on one breath. It's not only a physical challenge. For deep free diving you have to take your mind and mental strength to new levels.

August 11, 2010

Felix Baumgartner has already set free-falling records in this
atmosphere—highest B.A.S.E. jump from a building, lowest B.A.S.E.
jump—so now he’s taking his parachutes into the stratosphere. Later
this year, the 41-year-old Austrian will ride in a pressurized capsule
attached to a helium balloon 120,000 feet above the Earth. And then
he’ll jump out. Baumgartner is expected to reach speeds of up to 740
mph on his way down, breaking the speed of sound. No one has ever
accelerated to supersonic speed and decelerated back without the
protection of a craft (Baumgartner will be wearing a high-tech
spacesuit), so his Red Bull Stratos team can only guess how it will
affect his body. Fifteen cameras, plus two HDs mounted to his thighs,
will record the jump from capsule to ground and broadcast it to a live
TV and Web audience. If he’s successful, it could be the proof private
space companies need to take other explorers into low Earth orbit.

Read about the science behind Baumgartner’s jump and his rivalry with
French parachutist Michel Fournier in Popular
Mechanics.